


The Attendant

by Aethersprite



Category: Parahumans Series - Wildbow, Persona 2, Persona 4, Persona 5, Persona Series, Worm - Wildbow
Genre: Coil has a Bad Time, Philemon and Nyarlathotep aren't terribly happy with Scion, Velvet Room Attendant!Taylor
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2017-12-03
Updated: 2017-12-13
Packaged: 2019-02-10 06:16:30
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 4
Words: 8,862
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/12905895
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Aethersprite/pseuds/Aethersprite
Summary: Instead of triggering, Taylor becomes a creature of the Velvet Room.





	1. Chapter 1

 

 She opened her eyes to the strangest office she’d ever seen. It was spacious and curved and terribly empty, save for a single desk and chair in the center. There was a rug beneath her feet, but below that there was  _flagstone_. Who had flagstone floors? And… Those were prison cells, lining the walls. Where  _was_  she?

… She couldn’t remember.

“Oh, my! How terribly rude of me, I was unaware there was a guest!” She blinked, and suddenly there was a man with a rather long nose sitting at the desk. Was that strange, that he’d just appeared there? Probably, but it hadn’t alarmed her in the slightest. She supposed it shouldn’t be alarming, since this was obviously just a dream. “Welcome to the Velvet Room, my dear. This place exists between dream and realty, mind and matter… And it can only be entered by those who have forged a contract.” He looked around the room, before peering at her curiously. “It is supposed to change to reflect the state of mind of its current guest, but it has not changed at all for you. How intriguing.”

What a strange dream. It was reassuring that those cells had nothing to do with her, at least. “Sorry for just dropping in, I guess.”

The man’s uncanny grin widened. “No apology necessary, my dear! Certainly more courteous than the  _last_ being who just barged in… Oh, do forgive my manners; I forgot to introduce myself. My name is Igor, and it is my duty to help those who visit this place.”

“My name is…” She trailed off, blinking in surprise when her name escaped her memory. “I… I don’t remember.” And now that she was actively searching for the information, she hadn’t the faintest clue about who she was  _at all._

“Hmm.” Igor’s expression did not change, but somehow she knew that he was contemplative. “How unusual! Tell me, do you remember your siblings?”

She… Had siblings? “No, I don’t. I don’t think I remember anything.”

“Oh, dear.” The man seemed concerned. “Well, your family has always used this room as a rite of passage. It’s customary for rulers of power to be assistants of the Velvet Room until they find themselves… Though it seems that may be a bit more literal in your case.”

“A ruler of power?” That didn’t sound right. Something in her gut told her she was far from  _powerful;_ the title didn’t seem to fit. “Are you… Sure about that?”

“Of course! There’s no mistaking those golden eyes and that pale hair, not coupled with the shade of blue of that suit you’re wearing. Your family is rather uniform when it comes to color scheme,” Igor chuckled. “Now, I’ll need something to call you until you remember yourself. How about… Agatha?”

She supposed that it was just as good a name as any, so she nodded.

“Excellent! I assume you’ll be staying here until you remember enough to leave, at least, but perhaps you too would be interested in being my assistant? It would be your job to help me guide any mortals who come here. There’s no pay, per se, but I have never had an assistant who did not grow by leaps and bounds from their time here.”

Agatha still wasn’t sure what Igor meant by guiding mortals or rulers of power, but she didn’t want to accept the hospitality she’d been shown so far without offering anything in return. “I might as well help out while I’m here.”

“I’m sure you’ll do your family proud! Now then, you’ll need this.” A deep blue tome appeared on the table, and she could  _feel_ the power in it calling to her. “The Persona Compendium will be as invaluable to you as it is to our guests.” Agatha ran a hand over the ancient cover, so transfixed that she hadn’t noticed striding over to the desk.

It was both impossibly heavy and far too light as she picked it up, but something about it felt  _right_ in her hands. She started to leaf through pages filled with depictions of creatures both wonderful and terrifying, and then—

Taylor Hebert woke up.

* * *

Talyor’s eyes fluttered open, and the world was white. White ceiling, white walls, white sheets. There was pressure against her wrist and one finger on the opposite hand; when she looked down at them she saw tubing and wires snaking out from each, respectively. The hospital. She was in the hospital, not the strange place of cells and flagstone floors.

Taylor Hebert. She was  _Taylor Hebert,_ a fifteen year old  _human_ who lived in Brockton Bay and went to Winslow High. That strange old man was wrong. She had no idea  _why_  her hair and eyes and clothes had changed when she’d gone to the Velvet Room, or why she hadn’t remembered her name or who she was, but it was all some sort of… Weird mistake. Something to figure out when she visited next.

It never occurred to her that it might have been anything less than real. The knowledge that it was both a dream _and_  real had an unshakeable certainty in her mind; she  _knew_ it was so in the same way as she knew the universal constants were true. Like how she knew that the Earth orbited the Sun, that gravity would always tug at her bones, and that Sophia Hess was an absolute  _bitch_.

That last statement caught her attention, and tore away the smothering calm. It was important. It was very important in the  _immediate_  sense but she couldn’t quite place the how, so she rolled it around in her mind in effort to remember. Sophia Hess was a bitch. Sophia Hess was a bitch. Sophia Hess was a—

_The locker._

Oh. Oh, god, the smell and putrid  _shit_ and the suffocating dark. Screaming herself hoarse, clawing and struggling at the door until her hands bled and the cuts  _burned_ and the  _bugs crawling all over her_ until she’d finally passed out. How long had she been trapped there with putrid blood and  _waste?_  How long had she been there that she woke up in the  _hospital?_

Taylor stared at the wall and took a deep breath. She should… Probably be freaking out more than she was, shouldn’t she? Her hands shook somewhat, but beyond the horror of the initial recollection she felt more upset that no one had gotten her out of the locker sooner than anything else. It must’ve been several hours if she was in the hospital now, right? How far had they intended to go with their little prank?

A nurse walked in, and her line of thought was broken. “Oh, you’re awake!” The woman smiled, and Taylor managed a weak reciprocation. “How do you feel?”

Fine. She’d been shoved in her locker and left there with a  _biohazard_  for hours and everyone around her had decided they hated her enough to  _leave her there._  And she felt… Absolutely fine, if she discounted the light tremor in her hands. Great, actually, like she was just waking up from a good night’s rest after being dead tired for weeks. Like her tormentors at Winslow were just a hazy memory, sharp edges dulled by the fog of time. If anything, Taylor felt a little concerned that she felt anything other than awful.

“I feel alright, I think. My hands are shaking a little, but…”

The nurse nodded. “You’re very lucky they found you when they did and that Panacea was here last night, you had a rather nasty case of blood poisoning. The shaking is understandable given what you went through, but physically you should be fine in a few days.”

Taylor blinked at that: It’d been bad enough that  _Panacea_ had helped her? Wow. That was… Wow. “Where’s my dad?”

“I’m afraid we shooed him off to get himself something to eat. I’m sure he’ll be here soon, dear.” Taylor nodded at this, resolving to stay awake until he returned despite her sudden exhaustion.

So, naturally, she fell asleep as soon as the nurse was gone.

* * *

Agatha did not wake so much as suddenly become aware of her surroundings: Of the comforting weight of the Compendium in her arms, of flagstone floors and cell doors, and of the man at the desk with the seemingly ever-present grin.

“My, how unusual,” Igor greeted her. “I cannot say I’ve ever had an assistant simply disappear like that. Are you alright? Where did you vanish off to?”

She’d vanished? “I… I don’t know. I’m sorry, I don’t know what happened.”

Silence stretched out between them, until Agatha worried that she’d made a misstep somehow and offended her host. It was hard to tell, with that unwavering facial expression, but she hoped not. It’d be just her luck to accidentally make an enemy of the one person she knew could help her figure out who she was. Of the one person she knew, period.

“Best we hurry with your training before you vanish again, my dear.”

 


	2. Chapter 2

  
Approximately two months after the locker incident, Taylor was woken by her alarm and immediately began debating the merits of going right back to sleep. It was a school day, sure, but surely she’d learn more by just sleeping in? Not like the three bitches provided an environment conductive to learning. You’d have thought that after sending her to the hospital with  _blood poisoning_ maybe they’d be expelled or jailed or at  _least_ back off a bit, but nope. Nope, and one of these days they really were going to get her killed.  
Here she was, a being of fantastic cosmic power, and she couldn’t give three bullies what they deserved.  _Ruler of power,_ her ass; it seemed that none of her abilities as Agatha carried over to the waking world. She couldn’t even ask Igor about it, since none of her memories as Taylor carried over to the Velvet Room. It was frustrating as hell, being taught to summon demons and monsters from the depths of hell and use their powers as her own, and then not be able to  _use_ any of that power as Taylor.

Well. She summoned entities created of human emotions and beliefs from the collective human consciousness, not demons from hell, but. It sure as heck seemed like the latter sometimes. Some Shadows were magnificent, but… Others were pretty fucked up.

Of course when Sophia Hess was technically one of those people who contributed to the creation of Shadows, there were bound to be some pretty ugly bastards in the mix.

Anyway, her powers were apparently meant to be used solely for aiding and guiding Velvet Room guests so long as she remained contracted as an attendant. Igor had been very clear on that early on in their arrangement, though so far there hadn’t been any guests to guide. That worked out for the best, Taylor supposed, since she was still getting guidance herself.

Though, she was getting there. She could summon just over half of the beings detailed in the Compendium, now, and bend them to her will. It probably wouldn’t be much longer until Igor was satisfied enough with her progress to let her start to scope out the Sea of Souls… As Agatha, it was becoming  _extremely_ frustrating to not know who she was or why she was there. Apparently there were a handful of others like her out there in the collective consciousness, and Agatha was dying to meet them.

Taylor, on the other hand, worried. Would they know she was a fraud? There was no way she was  _actually_ one of them. She’d figured out by the end of week two that she’d almost definitely triggered in that locker, and somehow her actual power was allowing her to mimic them or something. What would they do, if they realized she wasn’t one of them? She had the Compendium, but just three months of training and practice. There was no doubt in her mind that a real ruler of power could kick her ass. All the more reason to squeeze in as much practice time as possible…

Go to school, or sleep in some more?

Sleeping in meant a bit more practice, but there was also the danger of maybe speeding up her possible demise at the hands of one of her faux ‘siblings’. Going to school meant facing the trio.

She set her alarm for noon and went back to sleep.  


* * *

  
Amy Dallon was asleep in her bed, physically exhausted after accidentally pulling an all-nighter at the hospital and  _emotionally_ exhausted after coming home at five thirty in the morning to face Carol. In the end an absolute miracle had happened and she’d been allowed to take the day off from school to recover, and she was definitely not going to waste it by fretting over her home troubles. No, she’d been practically dead on her feet and been asleep as soon as her head hit the pillow.

Amy Dallon was asleep in her bed.

Amy Dallon was in what appeared to be a lawyer’s office decked in purple and blue.

Both statements were simultaneously true.

A long-nosed man grinned at her from behind his desk. “Welcome to this Velvet Room! This is a place that exists between dream and reality, mind and matter… And it may only be entered by one who holds a contract. My name is Igor, and I am delighted to make your acquaintance.” He gestured to a girl who stood just beside the desk, whose golden eyes flitted across both the room and Amy’s face in curiosity. “This is Agatha, my assistant.”

Agatha’s uncanny eyes focused on her, and the assistant smiled. “Nice to meet you.”

“It’s… Nice to meet you, too.” She supposed being friendly towards these two was probably in her best interests, for the moment. It wasn’t like she knew where she really was, or what their powers were… “I’m Panacea.”

“Panacea?” Agatha blinked, glancing at Igor. “What a strange name, for a human.”

For a  _human_? Had they… Not heard of capes? Before Amy could ask, Igor continued. “That you are here signifies that some great fate will soon befall you!”  _What?_  “When that happens, it will be our duty to provide you the assistance you require.”

A faint ringing sounded at the edges of her awareness, somehow heard and  _not_ at the same time, and Amy got the impression that the man’s grin widened despite not moving. “Ah, it seems you must depart. Until next time, then.”

Amy jolted awake.  


* * *

  
Talyor Hebert woke up at noon, and immediately proceeded to  _lose her mind._

 _Panacea had been in the Velvet Room._

Amy Dallon, member of New Wave and the greatest healer in the world, had  _been in the Velvet Room._  Did… Did this make her a kidnapper?! Panacea saved her life right after her trigger event, had Taylor somehow accidently dragged her into this bullshit? What in the  _world_ would cause  _Amy Dallon_ to awaken a Persona? She’d already triggered cape powers!

Awakening a Persona meant subjugating your own personal Shadow. It meant looking into the depths of who you were and accepting the reality of who you were, both the good and the ugly. Every human visitor of the Velvet Room inevitably awoke one, according to Igor; though apparently Taylor herself was evidence that there was at least one loophole. But what demons did a hero like Panacea have  _to_ subjugate? She was a healer, so sure she must have seen some  _horrible_  things, but…

Apparently Personas usually surfaced in times of personal crisis or danger, so maybe that was what was going to happen. Still, Taylor could not  _believe_ the odds that Panacea had somehow forged a contract with the Velvet Room.  _Taylor_ was going to be  _teaching Panacea._

… Skipping class had definitely been the right choice. What if she’d missed their new guest?  


* * *

  
What… What had that  _been?_

Amy stared at her phone, torn. On one hand, it’d probably just been a weird dream. That was all it was, and she was probably just being paranoid about it. She didn’t want to go into Master/Stranger confinement and then have it turn out to be absolutely nothing,  _especially_ when it meant that it would probably set Carol on edge. On the other hand, she couldn’t shake the feeling that it had been real. The idea that it had been both real and a dream felt right, in the same way that the fact that she didn’t fit in with the rest of New Wave felt right.

And how could something be both real and a dream, unless a cape was involved? She should report this. A cape with a power like that was  _dangerous,_ and needed to be reported to the PRT immediately. There were too many ways for a dream-invading power to cause damage. She knew she should make the call, that it was the only right thing to do in this scenario.

She set the phone down.

* * *

The hospital was a place of healing, and absolution. So long as she was healing there Amy felt an uneasy peace, the guilt and worries of life outside the hospital’s walls ebbing away. They only stayed away as long as she was actively working, though, and as soon as she stopped she could feel it crashing back down upon her. So she worked, and worked, and worked, until she was forced home by utter exhaustion or worried staff. At least, that was how these hospital shifts usually went.

Today was  _different._

She was going insane, or she was under the influence of another cape. That was the only explanation for the unnatural way patients and staff and visitors alike cast shadows far longer than they should have; for the way she could have sworn the shadows  _moved_ in the corners of her eyes and, in a few cases,  _stared back._ The glow of golden-yellow that she sometimes thought she glimpsed reminded her of the girl from her dream, and the idea that they were connected sent chills up Amy’s spine.

Once or twice she could practically  _feel_ tendrils of black pitch reaching for her,  _clawing_ for her, and it was only paranoia and high-strung nerves that kept her from falling into whatever trap they were meant to be. She didn’t want to know. She should call New Wave. She should call the Protectorate.

Amy left the hospital early that day, clutching her phone with white knuckles, and she made no calls.

* * *

  
Taylor Hebert narrowed her eyes at Winslow High from where she stood, just across the street. There was what, two periods left? One? Perhaps it was better than nothing, perhaps not. She couldn’t help but think that she shouldn’t have bothered to come at all, now that she was nearly there. All school meant was playing  _pretend,_ now. Playing pretend with the school that  _she_ was a troublemaker, playing pretend with the bitch trio that she was some sort of  _lesser being._

 _She ruled over the power of myths and legends, and humans who did not belong to an Arcana were beneath her in the end—_

Startled, she cut off the train of thought. That was… That was something she might have thought as Agatha, if Agatha was aware of what she faced at Winslow as Taylor, but that hadn’t been a  _Taylor_ thought. And besides, she wasn’t  _actually_ a ruler of power. She  _was_  human. She wasn’t a ruler of power, she was a cape with the ability to mimic one to a reasonably passing degree…

She didn’t know if she was trying to remind herself or _convince_  herself, at this point.

Maybe going to school today really wasn’t a good idea. If she was having thoughts like that without immediately noticing, then it was probably only a matter of time before someone pushed her a little too far and she started acting like a complete nutjob in public. She was Talyor, here in the waking world. Just Taylor, with all of Agatha’s memories but none of her abilities. For all she knew, she would  _never_  have those abilities.

Better a high school dropout than a mental institution resident or  _dead_ , right? Maybe she would stick it out as best she could bear to for the rest of the semester, but then she was done. She didn’t belong here. If she was honest, she’d felt that way since waking up in the hospital three months ago… And Taylor didn’t mean that she didn’t belong at Winslow (she’d known that a  _long_ time ago).

She didn’t belong  _here._ She didn’t belong in the waking world. Was she even still mostly Taylor, or was she slowly falling deeper into her role as Agatha?

She didn’t know.

* * *

  
It was hard to gauge the flow of time in the space between mind and matter, especially when one had the habit of vanishing and reappearing randomly, but Agatha somehow knew that a little less than one month had passed between this meeting with the human girl and the last. “It’s been awhile, Panacea. Have you awoken your Persona yet?”

The brunette’s voice shook, and Agatha suddenly realized how nervous and confused the girl looked. “I don’t know what you mean. Why me? What do you want with me?”

“It is merely our duty to assist you, dear girl,” said Igor.  


While her mentor sounded unfazed, Agatha couldn’t help but feel concerned by what she saw when she looked at Panacea: A girl whose sanity appeared to have taken a sharp turn for the worse. A touch of anger and no small amount of frustration, that was fine. Unfortunate, but not unexpected. What  _was_ an issue, though, was the sheer amount of  _fear._  She could see it in the way her eyes were too wide, in the way she tried to make herself seem smaller, the way she looked like she’d been running from something for  _weeks_

She could see it in her Shadow, which had not manifested but could still be  _sensed_ in every way that mattered; an emaciated corpse of pustule-ridden flesh and jagged bone spikes, an empty cavern of a chest and abdomen failing to catch the mess as it seemed to perpetually devour itself. A parasite she couldn’t quite see had bored into the back of its head, and Agatha immediately stopped trying to ‘look’ at it as the feel of it against her senses began to make her nauseas.

This was the reflection of someone in the midst of self-destructing, not that of someone who had spent a month making peace with themselves. “A Persona is the result when one subjugates their own Shadow. It will be your sword and shield against the demons birthed of human corruption and sin, and obtaining it is  _mandatory_ if you want to survive.”

Panacea stared at her for a long moment, and then the mortal girl vanished. Agatha felt a sharp pang of frustration: She’d had nearly a  _month_ to get ahold of herself, but instead she was just going to let this destroy her?

And there was nothing she could do. She was an attendant; there was nothing she could do to guide her charge to the right path… Not when she was confined to the Velvet Room.  


* * *

  
When Taylor Hebert woke up, she knew what had to be done.


	3. Chapter 3

  
Finding Panacea in the real world was much easier than it could have been, thanks to the public identities of New Wave, so all that Taylor had to do now was figure out the best plan of attack. Going to her house was out of the question; getting the rest of New Wave involved was the  _last_ thing she wanted. No, she somehow needed to get Amy alone and preferably in a secluded area, and she needed to do it without giving away her status as Agatha.

Which left her one of two options: Approach her as Agatha, or approach her as Taylor. And based on her last visit to the Velvet Room, she doubted that Amy would be particularly willing to listen to Agatha.

So Taylor it was. At least she had some excuse to talk to her,  _plenty_ of people who had received help from Panacea were eager to offer their thanks… Though she doubted that the girl would be willing to meet up with someone who sent her fanmail just because the writer asked nicely,  _especially_ if they also asked her to come alone. And coming with another member of her team was almost worse than not coming along at all, with what Taylor had planned. Maybe she should approach her in person at the Dallon residence after all, then? That way she would be able to explain in person, and adapt her plan in the event of interference…

Going in person it was, then.

It was this thought process that saw her standing on the Dallon doorstep just after the usual school day, wondering at the lack of nerves she felt as she rang the doorbell. Oh, this was a bad idea. This was a  _very_ bad idea that could go so horribly wrong in so many ways, and all Taylor felt was a strange sort of thrill; that this was going to be so much  _fun._

The door opened, and Taylor found herself face to face with Glory Girl. Or… Not? Wasn’t Victoria supposed to have some aura that made everyone fawn over her? No, no, she knew that face; it was definitely her.

“Hi!” Taylor held out her hand to shake. “Is Amy home? I’m a friend from the hospital, could you tell her I’m here?”

Victoria stared at her. “I didn’t know she had friends.” A trickle of nervousness bubbled in her stomach at that, but then the hero grinned. “I’ll go get her!”

The girl disappeared for a few moments, before reappearing with a protesting Amy. “Hey Amy!” Taylor piped up, hoping to smother any further protests so as to keep Glory Girl’s suspicions to a minimum. “Sorry I didn’t call ahead of time, but I was thinking we could go check out that new bookstore! You know…” She pretended to try and remember the name for a moment. “The Velvet Room, I think it was called?”

Amy went pale. “O-oh. I-I’m sorry, but I’m really busy today with schoolwork and the hospital…”

Taylor didn’t have to fake her look of concern; her charge looked like she was fraying at every seam. “Amy, you’re going to work yourself to death like that. Can’t you spare an hour or two for yourself? It’ll help you in the long run, I promise.”

“That sounds like a  _great_ idea.” Victoria chimed in, looking more than a little worried herself. “Come  _on_ , I  _know_ you haven’t had any breaks for like a  _month_ now. Go on.” The stronger Dallon gave her sister a gentle push towards the door. “Go  _have fun_ with your  _friend._ ”

The door nearly slammed shut behind a miserable-looking Panacea, and Taylor grinned. “If you’ll follow me, I think I may be able to help you with your little  _situation_.”

* * *

  
She led Amy to the Docks, where the destitute and the lawless cast long Shadows. Taylor could see them, of course, the way they writhed and squirmed; but she’d never felt truly  _threatened_ by them. Maybe her lack of fear regarding them was part of the territory of holding the Compendium, or maybe it was the way they seemed to cower from her presence.

Looking at how they behaved now, though, made her think that perhaps the latter was tied to the former: They  _only_ cowered from her, and when they thought she wasn’t paying them attention they reached menacingly towards Amy. Was that why the girl had failed to summon her Persona, why she was so afraid of anything to do with the Velvet Room? Seeing how they tried to threaten her now, Taylor could sympathize.

Of course, her sympathy only steeled her resolve to do what  _had to be done_. Taylor knew what it was like to feel hunted; she knew what it was like to feel fear with every step you took and what it was like to have nowhere to turn to for help. Whether the girl liked it or not, she was Taylor’s _responsibility_  now… And Taylor would be  _damned_ before she turned a blind eye to Amy like the school had turned a blind eye to her.

Pulling them into an alleyway, alone now save for a single sleeping drunkard and his Shadow, she was silent even as she felt Amy’s questioning eyes on her. Even as the Shadow crept towards them with cautious tendrils, thinking itself unnoticed in the dim lighting. Thinking that it stood a chance against a  _ruler of power,_  if it could just get the drop on them—

She felt it pull them into the Sea of Souls like a riptide, manifesting as the sludgy ooze of a Slime. A weak spirit, rather ugly, and a Shadow she’d never bothered to summon again once she’d been able to move on to the better demons of the Compendium. As a demonstration, it was  _perfect._ “This is one of the creatures you’ve been running from, Amy. It’s called a Slime, and it looks scary but as long as you’re prepared it’s fairly easy to take care of.”

There was no answer, her charge obviously still trying to process what the hell was happening, and Taylor suppressed a sigh. She’d prefer to give her a little more time to let it all sink in before throwing more Sea of Souls brand weirdness at her, but… While Slimes were weak, they’d still be able to easily kill someone without a Persona.

She felt the familiar presence of the Compendium’s power settle around her, though it did not manifest visibly. She was still Taylor here, _thankfully_ , though it seemed that being in the Sea of Souls blurred the line between her two identities. It had been a risky gamble and she  _had_ planned for other outcomes, but this was the best possible result… A thin trickle of power flowed into her from the world of dreams, muted from the rush Agatha would have received but  _there_.

“Come,  _Phoenix!”_  The Shadow answered her call, though she sensed that its power was significantly lesser than it would have been had she been Agatha. Still, it was more than enough for what she had to do.

“ _Frelia!”_ The Slime dissipated under the Pheonix’s radiation spell, and Taylor turned to her charge. “This is my Persona, Amy.” A lie, technically, but it was for  _educational purposes!_  “The denizens of the Velvet Room helped me learn to summon and command it, and now I can defend myself from those Shadows you see everywhere. If you gain yours, you’ll have nothing to fear anymore.”

Amy blinked, staring at the birdlike Shadow. “It’s beautiful.” Dark eyes flicked to just past Taylor’s shoulder, where a portal back to the waking world had opened upon the Slime’s death. “Is that… Is that the way out?”

“Yes.” Though she’d never been outside the Velvet Room, she somehow  _knew_ where the shining doorway led. “Yes, it is,” Taylor repeated, before she positioned herself between Amy and the exit. “And now, Amy, we get to the real reason I brought you here.”

* * *

  
Amy watched as the girl who’d dragged her to this  _hellscape_ blocked the only exit. As her stomach dropped and chill of dread crept up her spine, the pale brunette smiled sharply. “See,” the girl continued, “I quite like the Velvet Room. They’re  _kind,_  there, and I don’t want to lose that. But, see, I’m not  _supposed_  to have a Persona.  _You_  are. They  _want_ you, because for some reason they think you’re what they need…” Oh, god, was this going where she thought it was?

“But if something were to, oh,  _happen_ to you…” The Phoenix that had seemed so pretty before now looked sharp in all the wrong ways, threatening. “Why, they’d have no choice but to give  _me_ your place! I mean, look at you; you’re not exactly world-saving material now are you? Who do you think would be better suited to the job, the one with the powerful Persona at her command? Or  _you?_ ”

World-saving?

That’s what this was about? This girl… She was right. Amy  _wasn’t_ ‘world-saving material’. Amy couldn’t even save  _herself_. She was a coward and a liar and a  _fraud,_ and even her own ‘family’ was a sham! She didn’t belong here, she didn’t belong in this frightening worlds of monsters and myths, she didn’t belong in New Wave, she didn’t belong in the Dallon family. Her grades had hit rock-bottom, her powers were a danger to everyone around her, and she constantly struggled not to drown in her own weakness.

(One touch. One tweak of their brains is all it would take for all her problems to go away…)

“See, even  _you_ know,” laughed the girl, before something angry twisted her features. “Phoenix,  _freila.”_

 _Pain._

 _Oh god every nerve was on fire and it was tearing her apart from the inside out, she was_ dying  _she was going to die please make it stop make it stop—_

The spell finished, and Amy found herself on her hands and knees. “Oh, you survived that?” It took a long moment to parse the words, sharp and ringing in her ears. This girl was going to kill her and she was a fool for letting herself be dragged into this situation,  _why_ hadn’t she put her foot down and said no to being pushed along? Why hadn’t she just  _made the damn call_ about the Velvet Room when she’d had the—

“Freila.”

 _The world was pain as radiation tore through her, dissolving her inside her skin and poisoning her flesh and she would gladly die if only it would_ stop. She was so close, she could  _feel_ it. She was so close to death and she just wanted it to be over, just one more utterance of  _freila_ from the madwoman’s lips and they would be done here and she could  _finally rest._  No more pain, no more suffering, no more guilt over the blood of lost patients on her hands and the hormones she couldn’t get rid of. No more needing to play pretend with the Dallon family, no more suspicious glares from Carol…

“Diarama. Diarama,  _diarama!_ ”

The ache in her bones went away, pain fleeing as her being knitted itself back together. Amy’s head snapped up to look at the girl with the Phoenix soul, shocked and almost  _hurt_ by the healing, and in her tormentor’s bearing she clearly saw the  _disappointment._ The devastation in those eyes took her aback, and she didn’t understand what the  _hell_ was going on.

“I’m sorry.” The apology was a horrified whisper. “I’m sorry, I didn’t. I thought all you needed was a push, I thought if I could just push you over the edge you’d forge the bond with your Persona. Some can only do it in a life-or-death situation, so I… I thought if I acted like I genuinely wanted you dead… I thought it’d be safer than waiting for someone to actually try to kill you, or for you to finish self-destructing. I’m sorry.”

The brunette turned away. “I… This area of the Sea of Souls should be safe for the moment, take your time recovering. I’ll just… I’ll leave. Go through the portal when you’re ready and it’ll take you back to where we were pulled in.” Right before going through, though, she hesitated. “I thought as a contractor you _needed_  a Persona. They said you’d gone a month without showing any signs of progress, and I… I was worried that if something didn’t change you would end up  _actually_ dying. I went about this wrong, and I took it too far. I didn’t hold back enough. I’m sorry.” And then Amy was alone.

This… This had been a test.

She’d failed it miserably. Just like how she was going to fail everyone miserably, in the end. Why not start with a strange Persona user?

Though she supposed that she was  _already_ failing everyone. Her productive work levels at the hospital had dropped dramatically the past month, as she cowered from shadows real and imagined. Her relationship with the other Dallons was worse than ever, and she knew for a  _fact_ that she failed Carol  _every damn time_ the woman looked at her and saw an interloper in her family instead of a daughter. She failed _herself_  every time she considered her powers and thought about how she could use them to serve her own wishes, how she could use them for anything other than healing and  _she was so sick of failing._

She didn’t want this.

She hadn’t asked for _any_  of this.

 **They’ve declawed you, my darling.**

They had, hadn’t they? Her powers could be used for healing and she was thankful that they could be used that way, but… Should she really feel guilty for not spending every waking moment healing? Amy had chosen to be a healer because her abilities  _could_  be used that way, but in doing so she’d trapped herself. She’d been trapped into a position where every minute she took for herself was  _selfish_ and everyone knew it, but  _it was her own damn life._  And the more she thought about it, the more…

 **The more you want to bare your fangs. Am I wrong?**

No. No, she  _done._  She was done with this, with all the lies and falsehoods. She was who she was, and the  _Dallon family_ wasn’t going to get in the way of that. Not anymore.

 **Then we have finally come to an agreement. I am the Lady of the Ointment Jar, she who protects from sickness and guards from pain; yet it is by my claws that the Serpent is beheaded.** _**I am thou, thou art I…**_

Amy instinctively reached for the back of her skull, and forcefully ripped away a fleshy mass she found there.

 ** _And I am Bastet._**


	4. Chapter 4

Taylor Hebert was curled up under her blankets, crying. What had she  _done?_ She’d, she’d almost  _killed_ someone!  _She’d hurt and nearly killed Panacea,_ and she _._ She didn’t know how to deal with that. All she’d wanted to do was help, rough her up a bit until the stress of being attacked on top of being terrified of Shadows for a month straight made Amy snap and summon her Persona. But she’d failed to realize just how  _weak_ people were without a Persona, and.  
  
Two freilas.  
  
That’s all it had taken to break her Guest. Taylor felt like she was going to be sick, thinking about how horrified and in pain the girl had looked.  _She’d_ done that… And it reminded her far too much of the trio. Did this put her on their level? Was she  _worse,_  having powers and using them to torment someone else?  
  
She’d just wanted to help. She’d just wanted to  _help_ …  
  
There was a knock at the door. “You… You alright, Taylor?” Her dad’s voice was uncertain but sincerely concerned. Of course he was uncertain about asking that, when she’d been so adamant about not wanting to talk about her issues at school. He probably thought something had happened with her bullying situation. And he was right, except this time  _she_ was the one doing the bullying.  
  
Taylor wanted to talk about that even less.  
  
Which probably meant she  _should…_  What was she  _doing?_  Having a damn pity party for herself, when she’d seriously hurt someone she was supposed to be  _responsible_ for? And then she’d just left Amy there, without even making sure that she got home safely! Here she was, handling the situation even worse than the school had handled her own situation. Taylor needed someone to ground her, and it wasn’t like she could go to Amy or Igor. Talking to her dad about this was the last thing she wanted to do at the moment, but. It wasn’t just about her, anymore.  
  
 _She was an attendant of the Velvet Room and she had a_ duty,  _a contract to uphold. Requiring the aid of an ignorant mortal was shameful but it was nothing, it was_ nothing  _compared to_ failing her Guest—  
  
And something had changed in Danny Hebert. She hadn’t noticed it immediately, but now that she was focused on the presence on the other side of the door… By some instinct, she just  _knew_ that the person on the other side was different. Not entirely mortal, she could feel the barest scrap of power clinging to them. To him. _To_   _her dad._  
  
She swallowed, uncertain. It wasn’t just about her anymore. It was about Amy Dallon. It was about her dad. They were involved, now, whether she wanted them to be or not. Whether she wanted to tell her dad about the Velvet Room or not, did she really have the  _right_  not to tell him? He practically reeked of the place between dreams and realty, and she was a ruler of power. Though he was not quite a Guest, she’d already failed to help Amy. She refused to fail her dad, too. If anything happened to him because of this, it would be her fault.  
  
Taylor Hebert opened her door, and let the Hierophant in.  
  


* * *

  
  
Amy stared at her closet, contemplative. She needed another costume, one as far from her identity as Panacea as possible… Enough to hide who she was, for now. It’d probably be nearly impossible to hide who she was forever, but buying herself a little time to figure out what she was going to do wouldn’t hurt.  
  
She was going out in costume. It was stupid and she _knew_  it, going out alone with powers she didn’t have experience with, and she was probably going to regret doing this later. But right now, Amy needed to get  _out._ Out of the house, out of New Wave, out from under the crushing weight that was being Panacea. A patrol would do her wonders… Or get her killed, but so would staying here. The girl with the Phoenix had shown her that she running from the Velvet Room wasn’t an option.  
  
She managed to dig up an old scarf, a plain dark shirt, and a pair of sweatpants. Not the best disguise, but if she could just find a pair of sunglasses or something… It would do, until she could get an  _actual_ costume. Besides, it was dark out! No one would see a girl in an extremely unprofessional costume with a scarf wrapped around her face and hair, directly engaging in combat, and think  _hey, that’s Panacea._  Even if they  _did,_ Amy was reasonably confident that they would chalk it up to confusion, or an illusion, or an ability to steal faces, or literally _anything_  but the truth.  
  
Everyone knew that people’s powers didn’t just  _change._  Not on the level it would take to go from Panacea’s abilities to Bastet’s. And why would Panacea be out patrolling this late at night, or without any sort of backup? This was an extremely stupid move, a very amateur independent cape thing to do.  
  
It made her nearly giddy just thinking about it.  
  
Sneaking out of the house, she headed for the Docks. It was where the Phoenix girl had taken her to hunt Shadows, and it wasn’t like she could go to the _hospital._ Not like this, for what she was planning to do.  
  
She all but stalked under the cover of darkness, and she could feel Bastet’s approval somewhere in the back of her mind. It was strange to have what  _felt_ like an entirely other being back there, even though her Persona was just a long-buried facet of herself given form: It was her will to fight and rebel and take what  _belonged to her_  (even if she wasn’t quite sure what that even was, yet), but it was something she’d done so well hiding that it didn’t entirely feel like Bastet was part of her.  
  
The way she reveled in the cool night air, the near high she got from sneaking out of the house, the  _grin_ the thought of hunting Shadows brought to her face… They didn’t feel like Amy Dallon. These were all things she’d be eating herself alive over with guilt and nerves. Something’d changed since she had awakened her Persona, like some sort of switch had gone off. The monsters in the dark didn’t scare her anymore. Carol Dallon’s ire didn’t, either.  
  
This wasn’t Amy Dallon’s way of thinking, but it was still  _hers._  So long as she had Bastet, there was nothing to fear; without fear there was nothing to keep her from just enjoying the thrill of her first patrol with her Persona.  
  
Speaking of patrols, she should probably get off the ground now that she was getting close to the Docks. It would be easier to pick her targets that way, make sure she didn’t bite off more than she could chew… There was a difference between not being afraid and throwing  _all_ caution to the wind, after all. And there was the fact that few people watched the rooftops, as long as she could avoid making too much noise.  
  
It also went nicely with a cat theme, but she would _like_  to believe that style had little to do with her choices.  
  
She’d managed to clamber up a building and somehow get across a few rooves- she was  _definitely_  going to need a few lessons in parkour soon if she wanted to do this nightly- when she heard it. Someone talking about… Killing  _children?_  What?  
  
Amy looked down from her perch and immediately knew that the night wasn’t going to end well. Somehow she  _still_  wasn’t afraid, but she wasn’t stupid either:  _Lung_  was far bigger fish than she’d wanted to hunt on her  _first night out,_  but she didn’t have a choice. Not really. Hell, she didn’t even know if any of her Persona’s powers would work in the waking world… But she couldn’t let this go, not without  _trying._  
  
There was a pre-typed text message on a throw-away phone specifically in case something like this happened, and she quickly pulled it out, tweaked it slightly, and hit the send button. Amy was probably going to regret it later, but going up against the leader of the ABB and possibly Oni-Lee would be suicide if her Persona failed to materialize here. And even if that was a risk she was willing to take with her own life, it wasn’t one she could take with the lives of a couple of kids.  
  
She could practically  _feel_ Bastet’s bared fangs and protracted claws just beneath the surface of her skin, begging to be let loose against the demons in human form. But how to make the approach? Did she go charging in, or stay on the roof and just send down her Persona? Amy had never summoned her Persona beyond the initial awakening, and she wasn’t entirely sure how it worked. If it was even possible, outside the Sea of Souls. If it wasn’t, then she’d… She’d figure something out. She’d work towards buying time.  
  
If she could just stay on the roof, that would probably be preferable. But as she crouched there, focusing on the feeling of Bastet within her mind, nothing came. Which meant that either it wasn’t possible and she would have to try to stall for time, or she needed to go down herself anyway. Then again, it wasn’t as though she could just jump off her perch… And who knew how much time she had to find another way down?  
  
“ _Hey, fuckers!”_  
  
The heads of what must have been at least  _twenty ABB plus Lung_ suddenly swiveled up to look at her, followed shortly by their guns and if she hadn’t somehow become immune to fear she probably would have frozen. As it was, being directly threatened by a mob of thugs seemed to make some spark ignite: Amy reached for the back of her head, just like the first time, and instead of tearing away a fleshy mass this time she felt something  _open._  
  
 _“Persona.”_  
  
Light flared around her as Bastet came into existence in the waking world, a black serval as large as a pony and adorned in jewelry. The manifestation of her will to fight looked down on the gang members with scorn, and had Amy not instinctually known exactly what it was capable of she might have been horrified at the thought of going up against the hoard with just the cat to help her.  
  
“Gale Slash.” She winced as pain shot through her as soon as she uttered the command, her Persona taking the price the ability required of her. It was a move she would prefer to avoid as much as she could, but it was definitely worth it in this case as suddenly  _everyone but Lung_ fell to the floor in agony. She’d paid a price of her own health for using that particular spell in Bastet’s arsenal, but it was nothing compared to that these thugs paid for being her enemies while not being parahumans or having a Persona of their own.  
  
Of course that just meant she’d weakened herself, and now she had to go up against a rapidly transforming Lung. Bastet growled as the man  _leapt onto the roof,_  frankly putting Amy’s twenty minutes of wannabe parkour that had mostly consisted of climbing dumpsters and drainage pipes to get onto a roof herself to shame. It was only because of her newfound immunity to fear that such a ridiculous thought crossed her mind, and a light hiss from her Persona dragged her mind back into action.  
  
Where the  _hell_  was her backup? “ _Kouha!”_ Amy yelled as the half-dragon monstrosity lunged for her, and a bright yellow orb manifested between them before tearing into Lung and bursting into a lightshow. She had the feeling that attacking a gang leader wasn’t exactly the most effective use of holy light, but it was still enough to knock him flat on his back. Had he not been conspiring to  _murder children,_  she might have felt a twinge of sympathy. She knew what kind of pain a Persona could inflict on those without one of their own…  
  
The nubs that she knew would shortly sprout into wings had already appeared by the time he stood up, and Amy stood her ground as the heat from all fifteen feet of Lung setting himself on fire hit her. Bastet stood between them, still as unfazed and haughty as Amy was unafraid. Somewhere in the back of her mind she knew that she should probably be afraid of her lack of fear, but. That was something she’d have to worry about after she got home alive. “Kouha.”  
  
Lung roared in anger and pain as he was forced back yet again, and Amy wondered if she should be worried about killing him at this rate before realizing that his powers would probably heal the worst of it whether or not it was Persona-inflicted. Probably. They seemed to recognize her as a serious threat, at any rate.  
  
The sound of a motorcycle saved her from needing to worry further about accidentally killing off the leader of the ABB, and she spared a glance downwards to see Armsmaster closing in on them.  _About time._  Who even knew if he was even responding to the tip she’d sent in, or just out here on patrol? It’d been a risk to send a message to the Protectorate instead of, say, Glory Girl; but she’d rather not get into a fight with the rest of New Wave over this just yet. Besides, she doubted Vicky was even still awake at this hour.  
  
She didn’t know how effective Armsmaster would be at helping her subdue Lung, but either way… This was her chance to make a name for herself outside of New Wave.

* * *

  
“Okay.” Danny Hebert rubbed at his forehead, lost and bewildered. “My daughter is a parahuman. Okay.”  
  
“Dad.” Taylor sat up straighter as more of Agatha shined through, almost insulted at being called a parahuman. “I’m a ruler of power, there’s a difference.”  
  
“And I’m an… Arcana.”  
  
“The Hierophant, yeah,” Taylor nodded. “It’s nothing you have to worry about, really, since unless you awaken a Persona it shouldn’t directly affect you. I just thought you should know about being a source of immense spiritual power.”  
  
It was three o’clock at night, he had work in the morning, and Danny was absolutely convinced that  _something_ had been in his dinner. He’d probably panic in the morning, but for now he wasn’t entirely convinced this wasn’t some sort of stress-and-exhaustion hallucination. “Alright. Thank you for telling me, kiddo. Just… Be safe, okay?”  
  
Well, it’s not like she had to worry much about her Guest anymore. “I will. Thanks, dad.” How much trouble could Amy really get herself into, beyond exhaustion and fright? She didn’t even have a Persona.  
  


* * *

  
_Oh how wrong she’d been.  
_

**Author's Note:**

> Hello! Cross-posting this from Spacebattles, I'll update this twice a week until caught up from over there. After that updates will be sporadic. If you have any feedback or constructive criticism, I would love to hear it!


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